3 Tips for Replacing Graphics Text in e-Learning Translation

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Graphics files – like JPEGs, PNGs, and TIFFs – are a common feature of engaging and sophisticated e-Learning courses. However, they can add inordinately to e-Learning translation budgets. Why? One simple reason – graphics lock up text. That is to say, once a piece of graphic art is output from Photoshop, Illustrator, or from another design program, the text is no longer editable, making replacement labor-intensive.

This post will provide 3 tips for replacing graphics text in eLearning translation projects.

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E-Learning authoring software optimized for translation

Graphics with text embedded in them are an especially labor-intensive part of e-Learning localization projects in large part because most professional authoring programs have excellent translation workflows. Articulate Storyline, Adobe Captivate, and Lectora all feature the ability to export captions text to a translatable format, usually an XML file or Word table. These exports include metadata and even template text (which both Storyline and Captivate have pre-translated into several languages). Course and e-Learning voice-over translation in these programs is generally cost-effective and quick, especially when compared with programs like Flash, which required manual replacement of all translated strings.

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However, graphics with text in them throw a wrench into these new workflows because text in them has to be replaced manually, even when source artwork is available. When it isn’t, the graphics also have to be recreated, which means losing content and decreasing quality – as well as adding cost to a project. Therefore, managing graphics and lowering graphics-related work is key to keeping e-Learning localization costs down. The following tips should help.

1. Don’t use graphics with text in your e-Learning courses

Yes, technically this isn’t a way to deal with graphics themselves. But it’s worth saying because keeping text out of graphics in an e-Learning course can lower translation costs and timelines dramatically. However, this won’t be easy. Your course may leverage existing content, which may include suites of graphics from your website, webinar presentations, document screen captures, or software scans. Your course designers may resent no longer having the incredible palette of tools in Photoshop and Illustrator.

2. Separate text and graphic art, and put text in timeline captions (or on-screen text)

Right before translation starts, you could also consider doing a pass to convert the graphics to live strings. This is one of the multimedia translation services that JBI provides, and in general clients have been happy with the results. It requires more time up-front, and perhaps even a loss of quality or aesthetics in the final course – though we’ve found that often, the final users can’t tell the difference, even if the course designers can. For large courses going into multiple languages, the cost-savings can be significant.

3. Rename the graphics files based on slides

Especially useful if you have an Articulate Storyline translation project. Storyline doesn’t have a library feature (in the same way that Adobe Captivate does), so that if your client doesn’t have the source artwork, it’s necessary to get the graphics from the published output. A good system is to rename each graphic according to the slide in which it first appears, then add a number if more than one graphic appears per slide. So the first graphic in slide 1.1 would be s1-1_01.jpeg, the second would be s1-2_02.jpeg, and so forth. If graphics are used in more than one slide, it’s good to create a table noting multiple uses.

Plan ahead for graphics in e-Learning & be flexible

The best tip for dealing with graphics is to plan ahead. This is true for all localization – planning ahead is the best way to cut down on multimedia translation costs. Engage your localization services vendor as early as possible in the process – if you can do so before course development, it’ll help guide your designers so that their final courses are localization-friendly. Likewise, stay flexible – you may find that foregoing some of the graphic sophistication in the English-language course is really worth it to keep costs down. Likewise, you may find that some tweaks to the course won’t be very noticeable after all. Giving yourself enough time to plan localization properly – and especially to prepare the assets for cost-effective translation – can dramatically lower costs, improve timelines, and improve overall quality.

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